WARNING: Use of Explicit language.
Updates to the blog have taken a temporary hit. I've started studying again, so they are coming out a bit slower but still hope to have new material uploaded at least once per month.
The main novel is based on the sometimes mysterious, fighter come financier, Davis Lockyer.
Several other plotlines reflect a shared timeline based on other denizens of the Sydney Finance industry.

Thursday, October 27, 2011

The Somali desert was hot. The aircon just never quite worked. Even when you had it cranked up
high. At least that’s what the crew of American Special Forces troops holed up
in a civilian station wagon thought. The legroom was cramped with boots and the
space filled with assault rifles and webbing.

They were coming flying out of the desert on the main
highway into Mogadishu. Twin dust trails spun up from behind the car. The
reflection of the sun in the distance bounced off the boiling tarmac. Heat spun
through every pore of each man’s body. Only eyes remained cool and calm.
Unblinking as the city came into view.

It was then that the sedan left the road, and stated to
drift along a side road that wound towards the coast and away from the city.
They drove for another hour until reaching the dunes near the sea.

The thick tendrils of the sand the only sign of their
passing. Within minutes the strong winds had covered any remaining tire tracks.
The vehicle was a high end V8 turbo under the hood. It also had long range fuel
tanks fitted under the chassis. The boot was full of enough arsenal for the
five occupants of the car to take out a small town.

Alpha-150 was the wait point. Army intelligence had got wind
of a meet up between some high levels. Of those in control of large parts of
the capital Mogadishu, there was no greater terrorist group than The Deadly Eastern
Wind. The terrorists were meeting with their pirate brothers at a remote and deserted
point on the eastern Somalia coast line. The pirate teams operating out of this
area were incredibly well organised and it was long suspected that they were simply
more mobile marine based teams of terrorists. The source of income they
provided from ripping off rich pleasure craft (these seemed to be quite rare
now) and commercial vessels coming down from the gulf was still impressive.
With the wealth of Somalia’s natural resources and its people in almost
complete disarray the terrorists needed a source of wealth to continue
operations against what was left of the existing government forces.

“Team get ready.”

“Sarge, are we expecting anything to come in hot?”, the
youngest member of the team, nicknamed Ali Barba, Ali had the gift of tongues.

One of those gifts was Arabic, but he wasn’t expecting to
need that particular gift, more his other an almost supernatural ability to
nail pinpoint targets at all ranges, in all conditions.

“It’s possible, but Intel tells us the meeting isn’t
scheduled for another three hours. We’ll recon the position then settle in with
some snipers and a snatch squad and see if we can’t get close enough to their
leaders.”

The Sarge lent back against the front passenger seat. His
gaze long on the hot dunes disappearing into the side view mirror. Reflected
heat seemed to amplify his thoughts.

“There’s something else boys. The targets may not all be
Somalian nationals. Reports are that some of the heat signatures are pretty
unusual. Too high to be human, was what Intel said. I want Ali Barba and Mikey
on sniper duty. Ditz you and Diego take point as the snatch squad hidden in
this shed here”,

He pointed at the digital map on his modified galaxy tab s.
Army modified so that the encrypted coordinates could be automatically updated
in real time no matter how intense the battle raging around them. Right now it
calculated the distance between the tip of his finger and their destination.
Distance, duration, time to each objective.

“Easy E, I want AA and suppressing fire from the high
ground. This is going to go down. Everyone stay ready.”

Fixed stares became iron hard, as each man said his silent
prayers.

“Whisky Five Oh, deploy.”

Sarge drawled from the front seat.

He had been monitoring the route on the virtual map and had
his own mental countdown going on. Whisky-Five-Zero immediately burst from the
vehicle, still under heavy brakes. Military boots tracks left heavy prints as
the soldiers secured armaments from the boot then left single file at a fast
jog towards the final recon point.

The squad were just shadowy wrathes in the sands. Each man
had dug in under a tarp, then had the last guy standing, Easy-E give them a
light covering on top. The results were impressive. Easy-E went back to the
high ground, and lay down with his Stingers and light machine gun laid out to
the right. To the left were a series of switches and a brace of hand grenades.

Desert sands, 22:01:23 25 km north of Mogadishu (west coast)

Three hours later. Late afternoon cast long shadows across
the sand. The ocean not far distant by the rumbling sound of crashing waves. Two cars from
opposite directions converge on the ambush point. Tall men dressed in soft
white flowing robes and dark rich skin get out of a silver Mercedes. Native Somalians’,
these presumably are the terrorists, Easy-E thought. As the only team member
with line of sight he was tasked with giving the encrypted voice comm start
operations. This group of men walked with casual intent, swinging their AK and
M16 assault rifles jovially about, talking quickly in Arabic.

The second group were just as casual but clearly more
comfortable at sea. This group was more eclectic, consisting of a Moroccan, two
Yemeni’s, an Egyptian, two Somalian’s. But it was clear the older taller
Somalian was in charge. He didn’t quite have a skull and crossbones, well not
quite. The guy had obviously watched too many pirates of the Caribbean movies
though. He had long dark dreadlocksplatted with small sun bleached bones, Easy E guessed hand or foot,
anything else human was too big. The pirate captain’s clothes were a multi coloured
assortment of garish labels stolen from rich wardrobes, the pants were a sturdy
black hemp kept up with rope that also kept up the contrasting styles of this
modern pirate just nicely.

Each member of Whisky-50 waited and listened to the
“chatter” from two parties. Their leaders were arguing. An automated
translation program filtered the signal and provided a rapid if sometimes
inaccurate interpreter.

“Captain you and your crew should be congratulated for
finding the suitcase undamaged. The deadly wind of the east will not forget
your contribution.”

The terrorist leader seemed kind almost fond of the captain
as he lent in and gave the traditional greeting. His smile would soon turn to a
deadly crease of concentration. The terrorist leader was not a man one
negotiated with easily, if for that, at all.

“There has been a small complication. The syndicate will not
sell for less than $5 million US dollars. Recovery of the cargo was not without
significant risk and loss of life. We were not told the boat would be carrying
heavily armed guards.”

The terrorist leader’s eyes began to burn. Burn into the
captains skull. The captain was blissfully unaware of the hatred being directed
towards him. He extinguished a half smoked cigarette in the dirt. Bending back
up he smiled at the terrorist leader, knowing that his words carried weight. In
the desert the man with the water was king.

“That is Unacceptable. You were made aware of the risks when
you were asked to hijack the old frigate Mary-Magee. The cargo in that suitcase
is not easily fenced, be reasonable we are offering you a lot of money.”

The captain didn’t seem to hear him. His eyes were blinded
by greed. If the terrorist leader didn’t pay, his crew of cutthroats’ next stop
would be a meeting with a US forces contact that could facilitate negotiations
with the CIA. Given what he’d seen on the boat he could guarantee they would be
interested. He didn’t really care so long as he got paid.

“Terrorist leader plainly the suitcase is valuable, we
assume at least one other much less preferred client will want this suitcase
“back”. Therefore what you say is somewhat ingenious. I couldn’t care less what
your group thinks, if I don’t see the $5 Million, this suitcase is going back
to the boat with my crew.”

“But surely you can understand? We previously agreed on $2
million USD. It is simply not possibly to arrange an extra $3 million for you
without warning.”

“Haw! The very fact you contemplate a larger payment tells
me something very useful. I’m beginning to see that Dibra was right when she
told me to take it straight to the fencers in Morocco. I did not as we have had
many honourable dealings in the past Terrorist leader.”

The terrorist leader’s head went red. His already scary countenance
dominated by blood shot puffy eyes, skin pulled tight, and a jaw wide,
jawboning his adversary before unleashing his final verbal tirade.

“You fucking cur of a dog. Dog shit eating Scum! Don’t you
understand? We must have that suitcase tonight!”

So saying he ripped a throwing knife out of the robes at his
front and threw down at the captain’s feet. The knife flew hard and straight
embedding itself in the captain’s right foot.

“Ahhhhhhhh! You bastard, kill these fools!”, the captain
roared, attempting to walk backwards, raising his hand pistols. The lights of
the cars were suddenly killed. Easy-E had thought both groups were with their
respective leaders but now it appeared at least one member of each group had
remained with the cars. As per the original orders the snipers would be lining
up primary targets in their night vision scopes. Snipers should be just about
ready to...

“Wait!”, the Sarge screamed over the comm line, encrypted
static burbling before and after, “This feels like a trap to me. If you’re the
captains men killing the lights is a good move as it causes confusion in the
terrorists, but why would the terrorists kill their own light, they don’t have
scopes and there’s no moon light in the desert tonight. Stay hidden.”

Indeed, thought Easy-E, the only man with a clear line of
sight in the blackness.

“Sarge, I can report no casualties from either side.”

“What about the pirate captain?”

“He is nowhere to be seen. Wait...”, Easy-E pressed his
right eye into the receptacle of the night vision scope. Somewhat disbelieving
he stared harder to confirm his earlier judgement. “Sarge, pirates are missing.
The man we identified as a terrorist leader earlier appears to be in charge.
Wait..”, Easy-E scanned the surroundings near the group.

“I can see a dead body of to the side of the pirates
vehicle. I can confirm it is the captain. Ah-Haar, he’ll be disappointed not to
have had a watery grave dah Capt’n Blackbeard will.”

“Lose the wise cracks Easy”, Sarge focused his breathing, it
was the time before combat when his nerves pulsated like this, blood to be
spilled, the responsibility of command. But he needed clear thoughts, something
was not right out there among the dark dunes.

Desert sands, 22:10:10 24.6 km north of Mogadishu (west
coast)

The terrorist leader stroked his thick black beard. He was
lying face down on a dune less than five hundred metres away. Away at the
bottom stood an off-road bike, tied to it, a shiny silver case. By now the
pirate captain would be on his way back to the small clipper that would make
the run back to base. Carrying $50 million in diamonds.

He looked down with night vision goggles at the chaos
unleashed. They had planned this operation, but had only expected the Americans
to watch by satellite. That they were here already with an armed response told
the leader everything. They would risk international outrage to get the silver
suitcase back again. He had several contingencies, but the warriors below were
tearing his guys to shreds. Time to even the odds. He reached for his small
mobile. Touching it he activated an encrypted web based chat service. Each time
the user account was brand new.

“Activate Archangels. Allah Akbar.”

The terrorist leader stretched to his full height and with
that he scooted back down the dune. Kicking the bike’s clutch hard he gunned it
back towards Mogadishu.

Desert sands, 22:11:05 25 km north of Mogadishu (west coast)

Sarge got them ready for battle,

“Listen up troop. We assault in 5-4..”

someone else took up the count, “3-2-1”.

Like well drilled soldiers it started with a distraction,
Easy-E opening up on the engine block of the terrorists’ car igniting it in
less than five seconds with armour piercing ammunition. The fuel line caught,
and a giant fireball exploded from the direction of the fuel tank, causing the
back half of the car to jump into the air.

As he turned the barrel to increasing his personal terrorist
body count, the twin sniper positions opened up on the group by the car who on
hearing he explosion had scattered like frightened ants in the hot noon sun.
Nowhere was safe. The long barrelled thermally scoped experimental AR-18 rail
guns ripped there targets apart.

“Double kill!”, barked Ali Barba.

Mikey swore, then made a 500 metre kill look Eaasy. The rail
gun made no messy explosion the bodies just dropped like potato sacks. He had
been waiting to get a double kill with the new rail gun. It’s lethal
penetration capability on soft targets made it ideal for punching through wood
and light building materials into infantry.

As the mayhem reached its zenith, the three remaining men
exploded from their hidden positions in the sand. Even rising bullets were
flying. Each squeezing the contents of a clip into those running from the car
ten metres away. It seemed to be a wildly successful ambush if for one small
detail, they needed some Intel to keep the desk jockeys happy.

“Easy, report have you got a visual on the remaining
enemies?”

“The terrorists are accounted for, six dead.”, Easy said,
and the Sarge’s assault troop checked the bodies in front of them.

“The pirates are nowhere to be seen, but that’s odd, I swear
I see the Moroccan pirate from earlier in the outfit of that terrorist leader.”,
Easy-E was tracking his scope across the dunes now, searching for any trace of
movement.

The Sarge had moved straight to the terrorist leader and was
checking the body with his free hand. The others had now formed a defensive
triangle around him.

“Mutha fucken cocksucking whore!” he roared. “We’ve been
played. That terrorist leader is on the loose. Who knows where the pirates are.
Ditz hold the pirate captain up in the air. Easy, that look like the Pirate
Captain to you?”

“No sir!”

The Sarge, pushed a tab on his Bluetooth squad link secure
comm. Transmission switched to include the squad on a call patched directly
through to USSCOM.

“Confirmed, I have the sat-link; he is in egress by
motorbike back toward Mogadishu. Time to follow n bag em boys, everyone mount
up now!”

The assault team moved quickly past the burning wreckage of
the cars, and got going. The hunt was on!

Mikey began to move his scope to the left tracking the
assault team as they made their way to the car. A gigantic explosion rocked the
car to from the right. The whole car jumped a foot from the ground, as the team
dove to take cover across from the car. Diego was off to the side, and he never
saw the two pirates that came at him from behind. Five bullets, three through
the throat from the first, two through the chest from the second. Honour be,
honour thee, the others silently echoed the chant.

These weren’t your grandpa’s pirates. Their preferred choice
of weapon the humble AK-47 original. Sold out of an arms dealer with gun shop
huts along the beaches of western Yemen. The Sarge needed to act fast. Before his teams’ rage revenge motive turned
things into a blood bath. He was holed up with Ditz near the car.

The dead lifeless body of Diego was just metres away but it
might as well have been a mile. The distance cut by the field of fire from the
remaining pirates. They seemed content to keep the squad in position.

A giant ruse to keep the high tech Americans from completing
their mission. Sarge should have known the pirates and terrorists were
collaborators. The Intel had been solid for months that these two groups had
staged joint operations. The terrorists acting as buyers for some of the pirate
gangs harder to store items, and excess weaponry.

The snipers moved. The angle was useless with the pirates
camped behind the car, they would have to take out the only ride out of here to
... “Sarge what if were to take the pirates car? Do we have permission to destroy
our vehicle?”

“Do it, now!”

“Roger that.”

The snipers moved through a 90 degree field of view until
they had located all of the pirates via thermal vision. Easy relayed in advice
from his alternative angle to their right halfway down the highest dune on the
high ground facing the killing field. Ali Barba moved his right eye into
position. Focused his breathing. Stopped his breathing. Moved his right hand
with deadly precision into place. Now the kill shots. Mikey acted as spotter calling
in the changes in height and distance.

“Target acquired. Shoot to kill!” Ali’s finger curled, and
holes started to open up in the side of the car. Precision holes that the rail
gun ripped at half an inch in diameter. The effect was amazing. Crouching
bodies became falling corpses. Their cover completely comprised the remaining
pirates broke hastily from cover. Ali Barba cut two more down with another
double kill. Easy E opened up with his light machine gun as the final two
pirates ran from cover. Bullets spilled onto the dirt surrounding him, the hot gun
was throwing out metal slugs at a voluminous rate that tore through the walking
corpses of the pirates. Heads popped back, as bodies fell to the ground.

“All enemy within range of close range sat scans are
accounted for. Only the leaders of each group appear to be missing, Sarge.”,
Easy-E was back in contact with imaging.

“See if they can track down Capt’n Blackbeard. Tell ‘em
mission parameters have changed, where going after the Terrorist leader. We
believe he is in possession of the target.”

“Sarge I thought capturing the terrorist leader was the
target?”, queried Ali Barba over the comms. Already he and the other two were
jogging down the dune hill kit shouldered, Easy just ahead of them.

“This mission is top secret, even I have no idea what is in
the suitcase. Capturing that terrorist leader alive with the suitcase is our
top priority. All I know is that we got sent because the contents of that
suitcase cannot under any circumstances enter the capital Mogadishu.”

The squad were soon in hot pursuit. The car they occupied
was considerably slower than their own car, but made good progress, and,
crucially had fuel in the tank. Easy was cruisin’ with one of his RPG’s
shoulder mounted and half hanging out the rear left window. It was probably all
that saved them. Several seconds later they saw what looked like twin flares
descending at incredibly speed through a high altitude arc. Swooping lights,
with the glint of what was it thought Sarge? Steel? No!

“No!” – he screamed.

Easy-E reacted without thinking he dropped the hammer on his
RPG pointing in the direction of the flares. Massive percussion sounds exploded
in their ears. The peace of the desert was ripped apart as a fireball exploded
from within the pitch horizon. Still one to go.

The driver Ditz never even blinked as he took extreme
evasive manoeuvrers. The car swung violently to the left from the road to the flat
desert sands beyond. It raced as though the road was a snake. In truth it was.
Ditz was running full speed perpendicular to the road.

The lights were advancing through the western sky rapidly
now. Mikey spoke aloud to crack the intense and paranoiac atmosphere that was
building within the car. Surfaces seemed to drip with humidity, pulses raced.

“Aircraft, 3 o’clock. Assume approach hostile.”

Data streamed into the Sarge’s pad, the others crowded over.

Easy-E had got his other RPG out of the window. This one was
gonna have to count. Easy-E placed his weapon arm on the top of the car,
draping it across his other.. face focused on targeting the approaching lights.

Ditz drove the car, now parallel to the road and once they
were once again in pursuit of the terrorist leader.

The pad was showing disturbing images. The aircraft appeared
to be unmanned drones. Armament level was assumed to be lethal to infantry.
These must have been the unusual heat sigs registered by the high level scan
earlier mused Sarge.

The drone came screaming in.

At three hundred metres it levelled its descent. The car
started to swerve violently from side to side, moving in big twenty metre arcs.

At two hundred metres the retractable machine gun barrels
extended from their pods.

At one hundred and fifty metres the bullets started to trace
a path along the ground towards the car. Bullets chewed up the dirt in two neat
little rows as the nose of the drone dipped and then rose towards them.

One moment they were tense cats coiled inside the car, the
next two dozen bullets had crisscrossed the cabin. It was shooting fish in a
barrel and they all knew it. Incredibly only one of them was hit. Mikey took
the hits like a champ. His massive front rower body relaxed as the first two
drove deep into his chest, the back seat was suddenly awash with blood. The
final bullet was enough. It ripped right through the roof and into his skull.

“Poor damn bastard never stood a chance.”, Sarge grunted.
The others clung to his words, seeing your mate murdered in front of you was
soooo fucked. Ali Barba just kept swearing, until Sarge eventually had to give
him the look to shut it.

Easy-E was the only one not to witness the gruesome killing.
His body was tensed half hanging from the rear left window. Guiding the sights
of his RPG through a tight arc as the drone ran past its target to circle for a
another kill run. He waited, he knew he had only one chance. This was the only
weapon that could damage something moving so quickly. Even so its evasion was
superior to a regular aircraft, it had no need to slow down a human. The drone
could pull 15g’s on the fly, then back up for another change of direction time
after time. It meant he had to wait till the drone was committed to another
attack run. Just at the end of its turn arc, just about now.

“This is for Mikey you metal piece of shit”, said Easy-E as
he thumbed the trigger squeezing tight, holding steady guiding the rocket
towards its destination. The drone had just come out of its turn and was
heading back towards the car. The rocket came smack bang straight into the
front of its nose, resulting in a colossal explosion that ripped the metal bird
apart. Clearly it hadn’t just been
carrying bullets. From half a click away they could feel the warmth of the
explosion wash over them.

The terrorist leader knew he had a healthy lead on the
Americans. Even so he did not have any intention of relying on his benefactors
air support. At forty he was a veteran of the gulf wars, insurgencies in
Pakistan, Afghanistan and Palestine. He had fought in Lebanon, blown up bridges
in Syria and most recently helped with operations against the Turks. To survive
as long as he had, meant that he was a man that always planned meticulously and
then assumed the worst.

He never went anywhere now without two contingency plans.
His entire life was given over to battle, and so his every move was calculated
on the premise that his world was a battlefield. Now these Americans had got
wind of his plans. Somehow. How had they? Who had talked?

No matter it was too late now, soon, very soon from the
chaos would come a new Somalia. One.

One that was? Hmm he didn’t really know. Then his heart felt
heavy and invisible tears soaked his mind. One that was not a warzone for his
people. One that was not a living hell of starvation, or a place of casual
brutality, or of the intercine warfare or murders that were left to be unpunished.
From this lawless hell would come a new Somalia. It’s people deserved another
chance. They would be given the means to build a new society.

Knowing you were winning was never the same as winning,
unless you were Charlie Sheen the leader reflected. He ripped the throttle down
and the bike accelerated an extra five kilometres an hour to eighty kilometres.
The fastest that he dared given the sandy uneven terrain. He needed to get to
the capital before sun up.

Terrorists car 22:31:26 5.3 km north of Mogadishu

The Sarge had rolled Mikey’s body forward in the passenger
seat. He had carefully placed a poncho over the body. The mood was incredibly
sombre but also focused. These men were elite soldiers. Each knew the risks of
his chosen field. Each accepted the dangers without question. Nothing prepared
you for the gut retching feeling of sudden death.

The men sat stoically. No one had congratulated Easy-E. It
was as though they had all pulled the trigger and downed the bird. The shared
sense of revenge was all that kept Ali Barba from cursing once more.

Ditz didn’t hold back, “Fuck!! Mutha fucker has turned again
he’s heading to the northern edge of the city.”

Then the car swerved once more and was flying of a low lying
sand dune through 2 feet, before bottoming out the suspension. The bike was
somewhere ahead. The pad was feeding higher resolution pictures now that they
were in the same grid as their quarry. Alarmingly another car was approaching
on an intercept trajectory with the bike. It looked like they would meet before
the team could catch up. Ditz floored the car, desperate for extra speed. Ahead
the car and bike were drawing close.

As the Sarge watched both vehicles drew closer but never
slowed to a complete stop. The icons for each vehicle shifted slightly, Sarge
immediately order a more detailed analysis to see what had happened. A couple
of seconds later the screen updated with high resolution photos of a silver
briefcase being passed into the car. Then both were speeding off in opposite
directions.

Sarge was starting to get really suspicious, none of this
made any sense. He ordered another scan of the bike. It still had a silver
briefcase. What the hell? He wondered if the switcheroo was deliberate.

High tech drones, awareness of sat imaging, it seemed
incongruous that terrorists that fought with low tech AK’s had access to sophisticated
tech and training. Maybe command had this one all wrong. Something was missing.
Something he just couldn’t quite pinpoint. Command responsibility. The pressure
to lead. His drill instructor was on his mind.

<Drill yard, Kentucky SEAL training facility> 15 years
ago>

The voice of old Jed, “When so m-thing dohn’t loook right,
it ain’t! Now keep your eyes peeeled for Charlie.”

“Stop the car now!” Sarge ordered.

Ditz pulled over. Brakes schreeched, as he rammed his foot
onto the pedal.

“Ali Barba out.”

Ali stepped out into the cold desert sands. He removed his
kit and the car was off again. No questions only a solitary figure, trekking to
the top of the nearest king dune. By chance this happened to be in the same
direction as the departing car. The cold skittish grit kicked up from the
wheels and spat into Ali’s face. He didn’t care. He popped broad shoulders,
puffed his impressive pecs, and set off at march.

Terrorists car 22:32:45 3.5 km north of Mogadishu

“Callin’ it in Sir. We are pursuing the operative rec name
“Blackbeard” instead of the primary.” Sarge barked into his comm uplink.

“What makes you think the other car is the pirate?”

“Just a hunch” chewed out the Sarge, annoyed now at his comm
link.

“The primary target is classified shoot to kill, the
briefcase cannot fall into the wrong hands. What is your contingency?”, said an
encrypted voice.

“Yes sir. I have left my remaining sharpshooter to reccy
with chopper inbound to final point of termination.”

“Acknowledged. Chopper is inbound on gps beacon in two
minutes mark. At current speed estimate point of interception at 0.5 km from
city outskirts. Your man will have one shot only.”

“He only needs one. He’ll make it.”

“I hope so” (for your sake) Sarge finished in his head. He
then opened another channel back to Ali Barba. A secure data transmission got
him up to date.

Ali whistled softly through the link. “Even I have limits my
friend.”

Sarge thought of his friend in Australia. Now seemed to be
as good a time as ever, so he said to Ali in what he knew was a terrible Aussie
accent, “She will be right mate.”

Ali immediately lightened up.

“Sure thing Sarge” (normal self)

Sarge and Easy scanned the surroundings with their night
vision goggles whilst Ditz focused steadfastly on the road, or lack thereof
ahead. Up till now every five hundred or so metres they had been seeing small clumps
of desert bush but not much else.

Suddenly they were closing in on the pirate vessel. The
pirate car screeched around. Taking a massive right turn on the desert floor.
Ditz let them get close then slammed hard on the brakes. Both cars were at
standoff one hundred metres apart. The US soldiers stayed relaxed and in their
vehicle, while the motley crew inhabiting the other car quickly dispersed.

But it would be completely wrong to say that those soldiers
had been lazy or brazenly stupid. They were simply extremely cunning.

Quite intentionally Ditz slammed the manual gear stick into the
lower right of the H working the pads so that the car positively leapt
backwards. As the team made steady distance away from their quarry, the quarry
in turn took chase in pursuit.

Thus set the trap was sprung, the explosives left by hand to
detonate did so. And in the ensuing aftermath men still walked albeit dazed in
stupor. The US team had deployed chemical grenades. They were taught during
classified sessions that targets would be “Doey” once overcome and could then
be subdued. This proved the case. Only
the leader of the crew who had been standing back somewhat distant seemed
unsubdued. Instead he was cackling like a madman.

The leader laughed as Ditz tackled him to the ground.

“What’s so funny you dirtbag?” Ditz screamed at him, he
wanted to say “You killed my friend. You fuckbag why did you do it?” but he
knew he wouldn’t.

The pirate just stared at him with a smile in reply. Ditz
pushed away from him and grabbed hold of a silver suitcase that he had been
holding in his left hand. He flung it back towards Easy, he then used that arm
to spin the pirate around. He deftly pulled both arms up at the elbow into a
nelson lock.

The pirate started to laugh again.

“Infidels!”

Easy went about opening the case. In so many tens of seconds
his electronic wrist tool had already cracked the lock. The case opened under
its own motion. Inside was ten million US dollars. At least Easy-E was pretty
sure you couldn’t fit any more cash inside. Sarge whistled toothlessly.

“What a fortune ai boys?”

Easy snapped the case back shut and retreated to the car.
Throwing the case on the backseat, he pulled out his machine gun.

Sarge said to the pirate,

“Unless you want my boy here to toast all your dazed looking
comrades, I suggest you unload with us on what the fuck is going on.”

The pirate sneered back,

“You’re picking on the wrong players Sergeant. My people died
for this country, and will continue to do so until you are all gone.”

“Sorry not interested”, Sarge sounded flat.

“Boys give me your comms.” They did so. He stomped all three
sets into the dirt. Busted tech good no more.

“Kill them all Easy!”

“What! No, you cannot do what you say?!?” screamed the
pirate leader. His eyes were white with naked fear. His legs trembled. Suddenly
his seaborne cockiness evaporated.

Easy-E held his machine gun two handed dominant position
pointing down at this targets. It was a heavier grip to master. He squeezed the
trigger briefly, bullets spat down at the leaders feet.

“Ok! Just please do not kill. Come I will show you.”

The others hustled him to the car as Easy went about using
the butt of his weapon to knock the other pirates unconscious. Driving back to
base, a relaxed Easy-E sat back on the seat, stretched his muscled frame and reflected
that now was the perfect opportunity to see whether his buddies would object to
a few US denaros going missing between here and base.

Chopper, 22:38:01 0.55 km from outer city districts of
Mogadishu

It was coming in low, really low. Ali was perched ready to
respond. The clear night made the game so electric he thought. The bike rider
ahead was speeding on looking straight ahead. The chopper slowed and rotated
slightly to give him a full field of view. His gun arm adjusted and he used his
knees as stabilisers.

The rifles thermal scope registered the target. The target
bobbed up and down constantly due to slight variations of movement from the
chopper and the extreme distance of the shot. Breathing out he held his breath
and calmly squeezed the shot. The terrorist leader was spun from his bike. He flew
head over heels, rag dolling towards the ground. The bike ditched into the hard
sands, along with its cargo.

Without thinking he grabbed a rope already attached to the
side of the cargo bay and flung himself from the chopper. Because they were so
low, by the time he came to a stop half way down the rope he was nearly at the
bottom. He broke fall landing lightly and immediately began sprinting towards
the bike.

At that moment, noises went off in the cockpit and the pilot
began screaming about incoming missiles. Down below Ali could only suspect that this
too had been a trap. But he had no time to lose, this silver suitcase needed to
be returned. He climbed aboard the bike, dropped the clutch and gunned it back
towards the open desert.

The chopper exploded in mid air. Its flaming wreckage tore
from the sky and came crashing down towards the ground troops. They fired
impotently past the wreck into the night, at the faint sound of a dirt bike at
maximum engine revs.

Desert floor, 22:45:03 0.5 km from outer city districts of
Mogadishu

Elements of the Deadly Eastern Wind gang moved back towards Hamid’s
body. The terrorist leader had been in charge of a team of ten originally. Now
only two were left. Such was the burden of operational success reflected the
leader Urqa. The remaining men would be reassigned to other important missions.
Some would not return. It was as Allah willed it.

Hamid’s last request to Urqa had been to check his body. A
slightly odd request but one that Urqa obeyed. He had his men carefully pickup
the dead body of Hamid and bring it with them. As they went to pick him up, Urqa
reached down and pushed his left hand through Hamid’s jacket.

“Allah be blessed!”, Urqa was in shock.

It was the object Hamid had been after. So, it was not in
the silver suitcase after all thought Urqa. Hamid’s last act of defiance
against the soldiers had been to secret the object on his person. Urqa smiled
picking it up carefully and wrapping it in his own jacket.

“We return to Mogadishu at once! Ride out and summon
everyone immediately. I don’t care if you have to wake them up, assemble
everyone at once.”

Men dispersed to the four corners of the city, while Urqa
and a small band of elite cadre walked back towards the city centre.

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Tim Multzein turned his head and stared across at the
screen. A large chart inhabited most of the screen. It floated gently up across
a line marking positive territory. The chart was showing the amount energy
being emitted by the laser. His laser. A laser he had designed to smash atoms.
He had spent two years just designing and building the diagnostic equipment
that monitored and controlled the laser. It had taken another year of effort to
get the laser working. Now three years later he was finally powering on this
awesome beast of subatomic power.

His lab was well lit. White walls and tables evoked a clean
room feel. His fellow researcher, Aimee Jackson looked back at the monitor and
smiled. Her beautiful smile lit up the already bright room.

“You’ve done it Tim”, her smiled pursed, as she looked at
the line.

“Increase the gamma emission range; I think we can get more
output if we do.” She said.

“Ok”, said Tim and smiled back.

Over the time they had been working together both had become
something more than just good friends. Being highly dedicated scientist types,
neither had yet quite decided to act on the nervy loved up feelings that had
both rushing whenever they thought the other person wasn’t looking. Suddenly
there was a noticeable increase in the energy output, reaching the required
level and stabilising. The generator in the background was humming steadily.

Aimee went over to the side panel where several more
monitors showed the rate of decay for a small chunk of uranium isotopes. The
yellow cake was in the form of a super high density crystal held securely in
place by a robotic arm that could position the modular design along a rail that
similarly provided the variety and multitude of different laser components to
also be reconfigured. Systems were in a constant state of test. Production
systems had independent maintenance schedules that required autonomous
re-engineering of both onboard as well as chip level components. These could
range from a new cybernetic arm or eye, to the latest in silicon injection of digital
signal gates and nano-circuit overrides onto existing chipsets.

Lines of inch thick power cables crisscrossed the floor like
giant anacondas. Smaller pythonesque yellow and red data cabling rested within
its recesses connecting each substation to the server bank. A final set of
conduit cabling carried the many network and optic lines that were used by each
device for running the server management application. In effect Tim reflected,
one team of two people could now achieve more with automation than the entire
human race working together could have less than twenty years ago.

Aimee twirled her cute golden locks of hair to her customary
right side. She was so cute when she did that. At least that always seemed to
be the cue for boys to start fawning over her. Her thoughts though were on
another plane entirely. Completely consumed not by the high grade laser design
skills that she had supposedly been brought into the project for, but by her
assignment.

“Keep Dr Multzein alive. Even at the expense of your own.”, Chief
of the armed force, General Clifford had said.

She looked back over at the
man standing at the fold out control station for the server core. Steel rack
mounted server assets were positioned neatly into every available slot.
Upgrades had had to be ordered twice during initial testing. He had been the
one both times to identify the bottle neck early before they had got to phase
trials. His intelligence on systems integration was almost limitless. Whereas
other specialists would become brilliant in one domain, Tim seemed to be the
master of whatever he needed that day. From electronic re-engineering, to
assembly programming or higher level C++ and C# applications he was an adept.
Right now he stood casually, wide shoulders cast in a relaxed and powerful
manner. A manner she found rather attractive.

Her own field of
specialisation was somewhat different she reflected. She had been trained first
as an ASIO undercover operative, but then in access to restricted government
technologies. She would never be a mad scientist like Tim, but her skills were
enough to understand the hidden databases she had access to. Databases
controlled by shadows that didn’t trust civilians. Well she reflected.. Unless
you were someone like Tim. Someone that they wanted to catch up to. Someone
that needed to be watched and protected from other nations.

Tim strode back to the
central control panel for the lasers now. Full of purpose. A giant of a man he
stood at over six foot three and worked out regularly on his footballers
physique. He turned the knob adjusting the density of laser saturation to full.
Her locks shone under the halogen lights.

“You know I never mentioned
it to you before Aimee..”, Tim started, keeping his eyes focused on the
feedback readouts coming from the central panel.

“but you’re not really a
civilian laser specialist are you?”.

It came completely out of the
blue, almost innocuously, such that Aimee didn’t really have time to adjust,
instead she said,

“Tim I’m not sure what game you’re
up to, but the uranium could become unstable if you increase the energy levels
too quickly.”

“Aimee, listen to me”, Tim
paused and looked up at her. “My best friend taught me a trick, so that I’d
know if someone was lying to me. Look into my eyes and tell me your a civilian
laser specialist.”

Aimee held his gaze and
delivered a cold and impartial response, “Tim, what is this about? We have been
working for months and months together. Whats wrong?”

Tim looked down, thinking to
himself, an innocent mind answers the question, that was what Davis had taught
him.

“Aimee I knew from the first
week you started, when you had to consult your computer for the difference
between the purple and green diodes we installed in the vacuum tube.”

She knew this moment was
coming. It hadn’t been a question in her mind of if but when. However her
superiors were not as convinced of Tim’s ability to see the truth. She knew, as
she calmly turned to face him chin down staring demurely into his eyes, that
she would have to reveal some of the truth, if only to avoid Tim becoming
suspicious.

The glare of the iridescent
globes seemed to perpetrate the intense mood that had been simmering these last
several minutes. Moments of science prevailed upon them both. It seemed in
these last months that she had really felt what it was like to reach ones true
intellectual potential. Einstein’s ladder to infinity was opening up to her
mind and she was loving it. Aussie girls were known for being both archly
conservative and carefree. Aimee had an amazing figure. All through school she
had been her families primary bread winner. Magazines had lined up, following a
national campaign which had left her very well of. Except that it was because
of that reason, that she had really never thought her lifelong ambition of
being an elite Australia spy, would be realised. It was a hardly a modern
phenomenon that spies had to be invisible. Modern times however had given the
spy game a much trickier recruiting path. Facebook had ruled out vast swathes
of the population. Google ruled out most of the rest.

“Get ready!”, Tim smiled over
at her, “1..2..3..”

The room lights were dimmed.
The neon glow of the server racks glowed tumescent blue. Red laser suddenly
ebbed from the quad head 1200 Megawatt power lasers. Each one had fat power
cables flowing greedily out to the power generation facility located in the
primary sub basement. Both of them quickly flicked on heavy anti glare goggles
designed specifically to reduce the effects by thousands of times. Suddenly her
world was made up of darkness and the straight edges of four high intensity
beams, each far far more powerful than an industrial cutting laser. Each
impacted, or at least appeared to naked eye to do so, on the yellow cake. In
reality they each targeted four very specific points in the object’s chemical
structure. The phased laser technology that they had designed and built was
capable of modifying the molecular structure of the uranium without changing
its underlying physical state.

Even Tim had struggled with
the math needed to construct the time matrix necessary for implementation of
phased tech. Phasing had been just another theory lying in governments secret
blackbox before Tim had done this she reflected. She giggled as she had when
she was a girl. Then shivered and felt a rush of happiness down her body. He
was so sexy right now, a man taking his first steps at titanhood. This
discovery once proved would pave the way for the creation of completely
theoretical compounds and agents. In turn leading to the development of
advanced bio meta organisms and nano powered cyber tech.

Twenty minutes later the
machine powered down, but to Aimee it seemed like no more than a minute had
past. Her senses were on high alert now. A mechanical arm extended into the
secure irradiated metallic egg shell that extended around the lower two thirds
of the uranium diamond. The robot arm’s three elbows (a neat enhancement from
Tim) all shifted down in perfect unison. The seven fingers spread in a perfect
half circle around the thumb gripper. The “open” hand cupped the diamond, plucking
it from its perch. The arm then receded into the chemical analysis unit, a
massive twelve foot rectangular box that occupied the entire north wall. It was
a complete lab and quickly produced a result. She whistled as she read from the
display.

“You’ve done it Tim, come on
let’s go celebrate your triumph!” she followed with an unconscious wink that
she knew would drive him wild.

“Our triumph Aimee, our
triumph..” he looked down at his feet.

“I don’t feel triumphant, not
yet. I won’t be happy until this technology is used to bring true peace to this
world.” Now his head was fully erect staring with a messianic gaze directly
into her eyes.

“I’ll come out with you now.
You’ve worked hard for me and I owe you a drink.”

She smiled. “Let’s go. One
sec.”

She punched in the code as
they left the room that would shut everything down and lock the room.

They walked to the car park
of the secure facility. Tim just thought she was a brilliant scientist, like
him a contractor brought in to solve a problem that had eluded the governments
own scientists for too long. They caught a ride in Tim’s XR8 Ford falcon. The
turbo howled, as they cruised the outback roads to the pub. If anything Tim’s
eyes had got more set. Great thoughts were in train.

“Do you realise Aimee, with
this technology, with the modified nugget of uranium back at the lab, we could
power entire cities?...limitless cheap clean energy. It might be the only way
we can truly avoid a future war for resources.”

“I think that you really owe
me that drink Tim.”, she hid her frustration, why did scientist types need to
be so clueless with women. She moved her right hand so that it rested gently on
Tim’s braking leg. She felt the muscles momentarily go rigid and then relax.
She smiled.

The country pub was nearly empty,
and they took a quiet table near the corner closest to a large wooden display
featuring the local rugby league and cricketing greats. Both were drinking MB
(Melbourne Bitter), the only drink that was on tap other than VB (Victoria
Bitter). A true country pub. Red dust, hard work and always the hot burning
sun. These were the constants of life in the outback. Such constants required a
man to quench his thirst. Generations of Aussies had grown strong on its simple
taste. But times were changing, competition had come to the beer industry.
Aussies always a discerning bunch, had in their laid back style, quietly
shifted their drinking habits to the newer super premium range of beer.

Tim’s head was dropped
forward staring into the swirls at the bottom of his glass, contemplating the
history of beer in Australia. Such a glorious and proud history. He stopped
himself and stared up at Aimee. She was so unbelievable, he still couldn’t
believe he was working with someone so gorgeous. So smart at everything she
did. Too bad she wasn’t interested in him on that level. She probably thought
of him as a friend though, she was always so nice to him. He definitely hoped
that that was the case.

There was a strange commotion
outside. Like a loud bang but with a ripping noise as well. Many things seemed
to happen suddenly. Aimee seemed to blur. The table spilled. She rammed him to the
ground with a swinging arm. The perfect arc swung tightly as it made contact
with his chest, punching him to the ground. Why was she attacking him? The air
filled with the unholy noise of steel rain. The distinctive catch of machine
guns loading, punctuated with the shearing force of the steel that pounded
every surface. Wood splinters seemed to fill the air. Furniture was confetti.
Where the flying fuck was Aimee? What the fuck was going on? He didn’t
understand, no, he didn’t want to. He was too shit scared to care what he
thought.

“Tim stay where you are,
don’t move, and keep your head down” sane words from Aimee cut through the
melee.

He looked up briefly at her,
crouched behind the upended table. Her slim curved figure was jet black in
tight black jeans and a figure hugging black tee. Only her white arms seemed
out of place carrying the twin 9mm uzi’s that hung with a gunman’s cold purpose
at her side. One pointed down the other half raised toward the ceiling. The
metal storm abated momentarily. As if on cue at that exact moment, Aimee rolled
end over end in a tiny ball to her right towards the pubs front door. He heard
rather than saw what happened next.

“Time to meet your maker you
cock sucking bandits”, Aimee roared as she rose from her combat roll.

She held the weapons steady
and unleashed a hail of deadly fire through the open door, just as quickly
retreating to safety behind the bar.

“Tim, we are trapped this is
an ambush. There are six of them outside that I can see. Can you shoot this?”

Her question was accompanied
by the sliding of an uzi in his direction. It stopped an inch from his left
foot.

“Yeah, pull the trigger
right?” His words must have sounded hollow and confused, he was fighting a
rising tide of overwhelming fear and panic. Man the fuck up Tim, don’t die like
this. His old friend’s words seemed to echo. God dam what he would do to have
Davis at side right now.

“When I tell you, and not
before mind, point at the door and pull the trigger, keep going till its empty
ok?” Aimee was already moving leaving the safety of the bar through the current
storm of lead. Moving closer to the nearby window staying out of the enemies
line of sight. Staying low.

“Now!!!” Aimee screamed. An
ear piercing harpies scream. The storm of lead had seemed to slow again. He
raised his right arm and squeezed the uzi. He tried to keep it tight and
focused on the door. Aimee was no more than two metres to his left. She didn’t
even glance in his direction. She had uncoiled from below the window, smashed
it and was hurling grenades from both hands out the window. Then she was
running back towards him, jumping the final two metres to slam into him even as
the magazine on the uzi was empty. For a second time she forced him hard back
to the ground. Finishing on top of him, she looked down and smiled.

“You know I like being in
control Tim. If you keep this up... oh, ah” she smiled a wicked sexy smile at
him that just as quickly vanished from her face. “Don’t worry these guys are
small hit squad. But we have to get out of here before they can call for
backup.”

Even as she said it, three
ninjas came sauntering through what was left of the door. Each held a straight
edged ninja sword in one hand and a smaller dagger in the other. Aimee left him
circling back towards the window as they advanced. They all seemed intent on
him. Tim shivered with fear. Anyone of these jokers could send him to the
afterlife with a single swipe of their blade. He shivered again, the fear was
like an ice cold poker that seemed to fill every ounce of his being.

Aimee attacked. Her small
daggers whirled into hands that seemed to blur as she moved. Legs constantly
sweeping in small quarter arcs making it impossible for her opponents to ever
face her front on. The right most ninja’s blade was caught in between her
daggers. He stopped and drove his dagger towards her chest. She did the splits
dropping quickly to the floor. This had the effect of pulling the ninjas
trapped blade arm to the ground and pulled him off balance towards her. She
rose out of the splits just as rapidly, pulling the ninja towards her as she
did so. In a smooth mini arc her left arm parried the dagger in his left arm
while her right disengaged the blade and planted itself in his face. He fell
towards her. She released her dagger and pulled his sword away as he fell dead
to the ground.

The other two ninjas now
realised she was the main opponent.One
continued towards Tim while the other advanced on her.

“I’ve had just about enough
of ninjas for one day.” Aimee leered.

From nowhere the gaps between
the fingers of each hand were alive with small serrated circles, no Tim
corrected himself small shuriken. Aimee expertly launched them at the ninja
advancing on Tim. The first one embedded itself two inches into his carotid
artery, the second at the base of his neck sent him tumbling harmlessly to the
floor.

While this was happening the third ninja had
started swinging in Aimee’s direction. She seemed to effortlessly dance just
beyond each swing. Growing frustrated the ninja raised his dagger and hurled it
at her. The power of the throw forced her to dodge to the left. The ninja was
ready lunging towards her with his blade. She raised her forearms defiantly
towards his swing. It was straight down, and she would be cut to pieces by the
heavy stroke. Tim screamed, he rose and charged the ninja from behind. Tackling
the ninja as he made contact with Aimee’s extended forearms. Only her forearms
didn’t cut in two. The blade made dull contact with metal of even greater
strength.

As Tim tried to hold the man
down, Aimee quickly grabbed his neck and broke it with a swift pull of the
ninja’s head. She dropped the motionless body to the floor. Inwardly drooping
slightly, then as she recovered her breath, once more exuding a steely resolve
and supernatural speed that had been a constant of the battle thus far. Tim
looked at her in awe, at last realising he had far more than a colleague by his
side. This lady was a pint sized Rambo. She carried enough fire power to take
down a section of ninjas hell bent on ambush. The kamikaze nature of the goons
amazed him. These people had a look of professional detachment even in some
cases up to the point of their death. Although he had seen at least one say
something foul in Chinese before being dispatched to the afterlife by pinpoint
flying shrapnel from Aimee.

Come to think of it he mused,
thoughts still racing, where was she? He turned through three hundred and sixty
degrees of total devastation. Every wall was shredded to the insides. The air
was so thick with dust that bits of plasterboard were floating lazily down. The
detached logical part of Tim’s mind mused on how much better the pub would look
now with the open plan afforded by having no internal walls.

Again he heard her before he
saw her. Waves of staccato fire came directly from his left out the front,
close by. Crouched now with a low sight through the debris of the second window
he could partially see a pale shadow drawing of the side of the car and leaping
into the air. Her form gracefully twisted, the lead leg drawing toward a ninjas
head even as he fought vainly with the air to make small tiny circles that...
Thud! Her foot cracked his chin, music played, another body dropped to the
dirt.

The other ninjas were
advancing on her from behind the other side of the car. No longer carrying
swords, all were armed with heavy AK-47 assault rifles that had been modified
for urban warfare. Shorter metal folding stocks, thermal scopes, and larger
magazines. Five metres from the car they simply opened up. In seconds Tim saw
the car would be ripped apart destroying her cover.

Moments earlier, even as the
men had begun to squeeze their triggers, Aimee was lying comfortably in the
dirt her right elbow stuffed into a patch of mud. She loved getting dirty, and
she hated bad guys. Oh! This was so much fun. Her heart slowed even though she
wanted to burst with happiness. Her right eye was pressed closely against the glass.
The long black sniper rifle had its barrel hidden beneath the car in front of
Aimee pointing back towards the three ninjas.

Like lightening Aimee’s arm’s
aimed, fired, cocked the bottle action weapon and repeated. The entire time her
body lay in a motionless prone position. Hugging the dirt below the line of fire.
More dangerous was the random directions the AK’s could go off from a dead
man’s arm. Aimee had been expertly trained. Her first three shots left each man
clasping his right arm, or rather what was left of it. One man appeared to be
barely holding it on. Suddenly two of them fell backwards, killed from bullseye
hits to the forehead. Aimee got up.

She scanned around then
looked back at the pub. “Come on Tim, its safe. Please. Come quickly!”

Even as he ran out, a silver
helicopter dropped in from the sky. The enormous roar that accompanied it
filled his ears. The chopper had official markings, side mounted chain guns on
both sides, and a massive bulb that was in fact a state of the art sensor
cluster.

Aimee seemed to relax to
Tim’s eye. He hugged her protectively with his left arm, looking over at the
imposing beast. Casually dressed men with blue eyes stared at him from within
it. The chopper was now hovering less than ten feet away, one foot from the
ground. Aimee hugged Tim back, shouldered the sniper rifle gingerly with her
left arm, racking it back on the strap like a pro. She gave Tim a gentle shove
towards the chopper.

“Time to get out of here
Tim.” Aimee’s words were like echoes.

Something was happening to
his mind. Hands descended from the chopper pulling them bodily into the crew
bay. Tim felt someone put a seat belt on him.

“Thanks” he mumbled.

Something wasn’t right here,
he could sense his mind drifting away from the present. It had happened before,
but never like this. All that death, all those killers... dead. He was their
silent witness. His perfect world suddenly felt cracked. Irrefutable
intellectual arguments became questionable. Give everyone a second chance...
yeah but these guys tried to kill us... yeah but nobody deserves to die... ah
huh, so it’s Aimee’s problem? His mind could take on each angle of Confucian
logic but in the end it kept coming back to the fact that she had single
handedly saved his life.

There was no question that
they had wanted him dead.

“Aimee. Who were those guys
that tried to kill us?”

Aimee considered him from
behind a laptop that she was still typing into. Without pausing she said, “Your
assailants were members of a group of Chinese mobsters who call themselves Blue
Tiger.”

Tim perked up, “You mean
Japanese mobsters? Those guys were ninjas.”

The hulking warrior in the
chinos and red flanno next to Aimee sniggered. He stopped when Aimee drove her
elbow into his side. But he didn’t seem to recoil at all from the elbow either.
The blow seemed to make a dull sound like metal.

“Oh Tim! You’re so cute. No,
there not Japanese, they’re Chinese. Blue Tiger hit squads are famous for
dressing up as ninjas. They are mercenary thugs with body armour, heavy
weapons, blades and Kung fu.”

“But you beat them Aimee! You
singlehandedly wiped them out.” Tim knew he was getting slightly hysterical, he
could hear the tone in his voice.

“Tim, you have to trust me
ok. Now is not the time, but suffice it to say, I had some help.” By way of
explanation she removed a clear rounded eye patch that had been covering her
left eye and lent over Tim. She cupped over his left eye and pushed firmly
until the tiny seals around its edge stuck. Suddenly his vision was filled with
tactical data. Streams of information flowed along, but the one he could see
related to the people surrounding him.

The stream showed video and
text that explained the teams’ current operational status, their designation
and mission parameters. It was clear from what he saw that they were an elite
espionage squad working for ASIO. Captain Aimee Jackson was there highest
ranking field officer. Her latest assignment had been him.

Aimee was to provide him with
theoretical knowledge of phased power lasers. She was then to remain on
overwatch to protect him from what the military expected was an inevitable
backlash. That had come pretty much straight away. Tim didn’t understand it. Security
had been super tight since he had started on this project. They had only just
generated the first of many possible exotic compounds.

Aimee looked at him, and as
if reading his mind said, “Hey look don’t sweat it. They probably had that pub
under round the clock satellite coverage. Seeing both of us together may have
been enough to trigger a takedown condition. We captured one of the bad guys,
maybe he’ll talk...”, her tone suggested she thought that was unlikely.

“We’ll be back at the
facility soon Tim.” She smiled up at him, filling him with warmth.

“It’ll be ok, Aimee. This
shit happens to me all the time dont’cha know?!?” he looked at her hard, as she
started to laugh. A deep belly laugh.

“You make me laugh, Tim, you
know your my favourite assignment right?”, he smiled back at her shocked by her
sudden admission of interest and the hot glare of the western sun burning his
unshaded retinas.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

A Test Of Australian Character – A Test Of
TimeChapter 1B by Tobias Nixon

No sooner had Davis Lockyer returned
to the grass and his corporate buddies than the police descended on him.
Inspector Ian Kramer was authoritarian and controlled in what he said,

“Mr Lockyer?”

“Yes”

“I understand you were present when
the helicopter crashed into the side of the building.”

“Yes”

“Crashed into the conference room that
you were sitting in?”

“Yes”

“Was there anyone else there with
you?”

“No”

“Well that is fortunate, but I’m
slightly confused, were you sitting near the door, however did you escape?”

“I was positioned near the door, by
chance I caught a glimpse of something coming towards the window, then instinct
just took over Detective.”

“hmmm, you are a very lucky young man,
just one last question.”

“Sure”

“We see your firm has declared
dealings with the Black Skulls”

“Yes, they have investment needs like
everyone else Detective. We provide excellent returns on our investment
products. Are you interested?”

Kramer laughed at him,

“Not on my salary mate, but listen I
don’t recommend Techred, Coutil and Banks do business with that scum.”

“Why ever not? They are the same as
all our other premium customers. They pay up front and have money to invest. We
have done extensive due diligence as you would expect when dealing with a bikie
gang with links to organised crime, and have never found any reason to believe
the equity they bring to the party is problematic.”

“Like I said Mr Lockyer, I don’t
recommend it.”

Detective Kramer left with a slightly
worried look on his face. He didn’t move far. Back to Davis he crunched over to
a cluster fuck of senior police who were “assessing” the devastation that had
erupted in one of the busiest blocks of the central business district.

Most
were senior officers, however one plainclothes guy caught his eye. The man was
casually dressed, his clothes were hard to distinguish. Come to think of it,
his face his body language he was almost blending into the scene before Davis’s
eyes. He had a cat like grace and seemed to at once be both standing at the shoulder
of Kramer, then in the next blink of the eye, be standing at the same shoulder
of Kramer’s commanding officer.

Just as Davis was looking away he felt
a draw in his eye, and looked back catching the shadowy figure looking directly
at him. The man smiled at him. Not in a particularly menacing way but not in a
way that could be in any way considered friendly either. Like an; “I see you
fucker, and I know who, what, you are.”

The company secretary had worked
tirelessly for the last twenty minutes to gather everybody around her boss the
CEO Michael Douglas Weyman. He now held court, and Davis moved over to stand at
the edge of the assembly.

“Guys! I’m proud of you. Today was an
extremely difficult day for us. Thanks to some fast thinking and a bit of luck,
everyone will be ok. I can’t ask you to go back in there..”

chuckles and outright laughter are
quickly replaced by more silence.

“The company has an offsite recovery
site so our server infrastructure is intact and failed over the moment the
techies cut the switch. You have all been given RSA tokens, so please head home
now and as of tomorrow continue your work from home. Please speak to your
managers before you leave. Thanks team!”

Time to bail, Davis said goodbye to
his team and started walking back towards Wynyard with Ronnie. The distance and
the walking seemed to help him think. He had made lots of money on the thinking
man’s walk through Martin Place. It had overtaken the hot shower in the morning
as the biggest gold mine of new ideas.

“I don’t know about you Davis, but I
don’t really want to go home right now..”

Said Ronnie, the long haired brunette
was tilting her head at him, letting the rays of sun glint magically from her
long shiny locks.

“There’s something special about you
Ronnie”

Davis started,

“But I don’t really feel like an all
night bender, off my chops crawling along Oxford Street at four in the
morning.”

He smiled realising how lame he
probably sounded to this hungry hot young lady.

“Not at all Davis, I didn’t mean
that...” She stopped talking and stepped in closer towards him.

“I’m..” he waited patiently, picked up
her right hand and held it.

“I’m a bit scared tbh, nothing like
this has ever happened to me before.” [pause]

“Can you come over for a bit?” Davis
just nodded, it had never been this easy before, especially not with someone as
drop dead gorgeous as Ronnie. Girls – what a fucken ongoing mystery he thought.

They swung by the DJs food mall on
Pitt street picking up an impressive array of things for dinner, and a bottle
of Semillon Sauvignon Blanc. The trip back to Ronnie place was uneventful, but
Davis could feel his nervousness increasing. His heart beat raced. He’d never
really thought of trying to actually follow through with the constant flirting
which they enjoyed each day. Now she was asking him to deliver. His skin raced
with a feeling of static electricity. His spine tingled.

The sun had dipped, and late afternoon
had been replaced by the shadows of early evening. People walked quickly to
their ride home. The streets were packed with fast paced salary men.

Two blocks from Ronnie’s place, and
the two of them were keeping up good banter, enjoying the warmth and security
of each other’s company. The late afternoon of the Emerald isle was always
deliciously intoxicating to young couples. The warm air and seductive promise
of the night gave purpose and intent to their journey. The sea of suits seemed
to thin. The corner was still one hundred metres away, they were walking past
the Queen Victoria Building where the crowds were a thick stream unending flow.

The lovey-dovey moment faded. Davis
looked harder at the shadows running down each shop wall. Given the events of
the day Davis felt justified in being jumpy. The slightest thing out of place
and it was making him jump like a bitch in a dead end alley. Loosen up he told
himself stop looking for shadows to jump at.

The shadows. The twenty metre stretch
of crowd in front of them was covered in unnatural shadows. Davis skin was
crawling badly now, years of hard training in Thailand starting in his late
teens made what happened next, happen on a purely instinctive level. The
shadows were men in dark suits that leaped forward impossibly fast. Davis used
his free left hand to push Ronnie well behind him, forcing her back towards the
crowd, and in one continuous motion completed a graceful spin move which
started him running towards the oncoming ninjas.

There were five of them, each carrying
short flat blades that looked like the thinner Chinese or Siamese weapon than the
thicker better wrought Japanese version. It didn’t matter the results of being
stuck by one were the same. Death cleared Davis’s mind of any thought, his mind
was primed for attack. In this case how to survive the onslaught of a squad of
death dealing ninjas.

The first ninja warrior to his left slowed as he closed
the final metre, rolling past and to the left of Davis so that he came up
directly behind him. As the human shadow rose his blade cut smoothly in an arc
through the air towards where he thought Davis’s throat should have been.
Several seconds earlier the second ninja had also closed the distance. This
shadow was then in the act of following up with a second blade directly to
where Davis’s sternum should have been.

“In battle sped is of the greatest concern, it
is the road to victory.” – Sun Tzu.

Davis was a student of the master. In
a moment that seemed to speed up and slow down simultaneously, he had jumped
and caught the overhanging roof awning outside the two dollar shop that was the
stage for his impromptu street battle.

He dangled for less than a second,
just long enough to let the first two get too close to each other, and then he
dropped. His right hand came down in a powerful arc, letting the dynamic of
falling turn his hand chop, which hit the first ninjas shoulder, into a force
equal to over a quarter of a tonne. In an instant the ninja’s collar bone
snapped, forcing him to crouch on the ground in agony. As his feet touched the
ground he rounded and spun on his back leg bringing his left hand up and
catching the short blade falling from the broken mans arm. This was instantly
pivoted in the left wrist turning back towards the body of the second ninja,
even as a third one glided in from the right making lightening quick short
stabs straight at Davis’s midriff. Instead of pulling back he continued moving
forward.

Slamming his blade into the blade of
the second ninja, he pushed up violently in a brutal motion that forced the
man’s arms into his head, a rough punching action that slammed the man’s own
sword handle into his nose. He spun hard moving around to face his back. The
fourth ninja moved in from the shadows raising a sickle looking weapon high and
bringing it down towards Davis’s head, the third ninja moved off balance as his
blade sailed harmlessly through the air where Davis had been standing. Davis
pushed hard and slammed into the back of the second one, pushing him into the
third. At the same time he threw a reverse leg kick pushing out hard and
slamming the hardened heal of his foot with a sickening crunch into the balls
of his enemy.

The guy crumbled with an audible curse
“ta ma de” [Chinese:Fuck], so these
guys weren’t true ninjas thought Davis, at least one of them was Chinese,
probably all of them. That meant this was likely a gang sent from the mainland.
No one that he had seen in the local fight scene had shown these kinds of
skills, at least not five guys with this much talent. Lucky he thought that
they weren’t really ninjas.

Such idea thought bubbles were like a
thin wisp of smoke, when the battle demanded his full attention, demanded he
keep a clear head. He pivoted again on his back leg, adopting a low crouching
stance, as he grabbed a handful of the fourth ninja’s hooded head and pulling
him like a battering ram towards his buddies.

He knocked this one out by ramming him
into the second one, who was now off balance. In a flurry of hand movements he
threw 10 hard punches to his adversary’s solar plexus. Predictably the forearms
protecting the head and neck dropped.

Davis moved in very close, never slowing
as in a smooth arc, he wrapped his thick right forearm around the back of the
neck of the second ninja. The dark hood shook slightly, groggily, as Davis
crashed it down into his sleeping buddy. Blood spilled from head wounds on both
men. The ground had taken on a light hue of dark red.

The third and fifth men
circled him now, wearily, blades drawn out pointed in. The blades were dancing
now.

They had seen how quickly Davis worked
without a blade but by keeping distance and moving as a team it would or should
be significantly harder for their adversary. The blades rose and dove cutting
towards their intended victim.

The victim bit back. Davis ducked then rose in a
side lunge to the left, rolling even as he rose and launching from the roll
straight into a tackle into the fifth’s left leg. The chop from the swinging
sword arm came down off target pulled of course by the tackle in a much wider
arc. It caught the other pseudo ninja in the upper right arm, burying deep.

“Ahhhhhhhhh!” screamed the assailant.

Now only the fifth and final shadow
man remained. Davis’ left leg shot out catching the guard of the blade,
knocking it to the ground. Davis then started a feint, using a combo of two
swift left jabs and a right cross to the man’s head, the arms of his opponent
went straight up to protect himself. Davis was already shifting to his right,
turning inwards away from the ninja.

His next left hook quickly turned into a
reverse left elbow to the stomach. The elbow made contact ripping up into the
sternum forcing the arms down. Davis was already in another small arc pivoting
one hundred and eighty degrees to bring a twelve to six right elbow sailing
down from above.

It cracked his opponent right on the crown of the head,
forcing him to stumble backwards. Davis spun again this time three hundred and
sixty degrees and followed up with a spinning heal kick that landed cleanly on
the fifth’s head snapping it back in an audible thud. Knocked out before he
even hit the ground.

Davis looked around surveying the
carnage. He quickly removed one of the hoods. The Asiatic features were
distinctive. As a long time resident of South East Asia, Davis knew his hunch
about them being from a Chinese gang was correct.

More worryingly this guy had
a gang tattoo of a red teardrop under his right eye. Proof enough of
involvement from mainland china. The Blue Tiger were in Australia. Shit had got
very serious.

He moved back towards where he’d left
Ronnie. She was standing at the front of a small crowd that were transfixed,
forming an open ring of people stunned into silence by the intense one way
nature of the fight. Clearly no one knew quite whether to cheer or run.

Several
were already on their mobiles to the police.Most likely grainy footage would be on the nightly news or at least the
local YouTube channels. It was time to move. He held her, whispering to her
that they had to clear the scene in case more ninjas arrived.

They shared a
long undefined moment of tenderness, lost in a tight embrace of shared nervousness
and fear. He could smell her fear.

Davis looked back around at the crowd.
A white van with no number plates had pulled up next to the pavement,the unconscious and the dead ninjas were
already loaded into the van, the door slamming shut ripping out into the
traffic narrowly missing oncoming traffic as it used the other lane to jump
ahead.

Why Davis considered, did they not
want their identities revealed? Why didn’t they want the authorities to know
that the Blue Tiger was on a secret mission into the heart of Australia’s
largest city?

By rights the five mercenaries that had been sent would have been
able to take down almost anyone. There masters would not make that mistake
twice. Blue Tiger were drug traffickers, gun runners and slavers extraordinaire.
He had to get out of here.

The timing was too much to be a
coincidence, he thought as he pulled Ronnie quickly through the crowd. She was
in shock, as many of the watchers in the crowd were. So much blood and violence
was to the uninitiated almost inconceivable until you lived through it once or
twice he reflected.

As he marched on it was two blocks before the parting crowd
started to recede again and the pair returned to a relative state of
anonymity.He reasoned even with the
lack of hard evidence, some grainy iPhone footage would on the six o’clock
news.

Before long he was going to get more questions from Inspector Kramer, and
he had fuck all by way of answers. Answers, he needed some.

They marched on desperate now to get
to a place of relative safety. His calm even pace and alert protective nature,
seemed to feed into her growing sense of panic and need for control.

She looked
over at him every five or six paces trying to gauge his thoughts or just ground
her thoughts? He could have calmed her but he didn’t even try.

“When times are easy be tough, when times get
tricky it won’t be as rough”
– Jo-Jo “Muay Thai” Pho,

His kickboxing instructor had often
seemed to be far more of a master of the internal arts than just the external
brutality for which he was renowned throughout Thailand for. If he let her ride
it out now, her own mind would have significant mental defences should she have
to go through it again, something he had no way of knowing. If he made her feel
better she would be at best a liability, at worst a basket case for the rest of
her life. He did however turn and smile at her.

“You really are as pretty as a rose,
Ronnie, I don’t know why I never told you that before.”

She smiled exquisitely back at him,
her lower lip trembling, but never took her eyes away from his. The moment
seemed to slow, as her eyes searched his face looking for signs of weakness.
Some common ground for her fear to feed on.

There was nothing. Ironically this
seemed to feed her hunger. She stared again, but he was striding ahead pulling
her with him towards the entrance to her inner city apartment block.

“Ronnie, let’s get you home, I’ll make
you dinner. Also I don’t think its safe tonight, do you mind if I sleep on the
couch. We’ll go see the cop shop first thing in the morning.”, Davis had a voice
that was at once casual, yet also very firm.

It said I am dependable, something he
had found over time that women loved. It said I am a secure human being.

It
probably helped that he was also being sincere.

“Ok” –Ronnie.

They entered the lift. Her nerves were
too much. She.. broke down crying pushing herself into him, and then it was on.
The lift was a whirl of two bodies unleashing months of pent up passion. Davis
felt her sweet lips and waited trying to savour the moment, praying the lift
would rise even faster. He wanted so badly to fuck her brains out right now.

“Slowly Davis” Ronnie cooed, “I want
you to hold me, all night. I want you zooo bad. I’m scared and I really don’t
want to be alone.”

Lonely darkness descended on the city.
Random lights filtered through the bedroom window as they lay in bed together
naked. His chiselled stomach was pushed up flat against her tasty curves. His
left hand loosely hanging on to her right breast.

Her skin was so soft and
peachy reflected Davis as he relaxed in post coital bliss. Her hands never
stopped moving, strugglingly to cover every part of his ripped musculature. He
could tell she still awake, all they could think of was more of the same. He
stared at her, and felt a shiver of pleasure run down his spine. Her body was
hot from sex; the temperature was rising.

Hours later, in the small hours past
midnight, Davis lay awake by himself, the sleeping body of an angel beside him.
The full moon was hanging low in the sky. He deliberately avoided looking at
it, preferring to conserve as much of his natural night vision as possible. The
one bedroom apartment was fifteen stories up, sitting just behind town hall, on
Liverpool Street.

His gaze fell to the bed sheets; the soft duvet was made with
Egyptian cotton and duck down feathers. He imagined her curvaceous white body
beneath the surface. He knew what he had to do now. He needed to form a circle,
enter back into the dream world, speak with his father.

But to do that, to be
able to stay long enough and have the strength to hear his father’s words he
would need help. He simply wasn’t developed enough to do it on his own. He
needed to go and see the tribal elder.

As Davis ideally thought of the
magical times of his childhood, spent following the tribe around central western
N.S.W., memories of rites and rituals came back to him. The first time he had
been taken into the dreaming.

The visions that had resulted, and the endless
conversations which his dad, Bear had said were all part of fine tuning his
“receptivity” to the practise. Even now he could barely summon the dreaming on
his own. Today in the office had been a strange fluke.

“The need comes with the moment, the moment is
created from the person’s need.”
–Cub.

Cub, his uncle the one who had saved
him. Had it been him? Or was it just his imagination? Something had stopped a
couple of hundred gallons of jet fuel from exploding in his face. Cub hadn’t
done that though. He had seen him fighting with a fire elemental.

The huge
fiery being had looked alive with rage. Had wanted to kill him. Cub had calmly
held it at bay. Stopped the fuel from igniting?He only had questions and desperately needed to advance his
understanding of these strange events.

The ridges and dips of the duvet were
like a mini mountain range. It reminded Davis of his adventures in the
Himalayas. Looking at a particular spike it reminded him of the ascent up the
Eisner, or crossing one of the major ridgelines after base camp on the northern
ascent of Everest. That light red line looked out of place though. A laser
light coming from... Thoughts stopped, adrenaline pumped hard forcing his
muscles to take on super human levels of strength. Rock hard arms wrapped
around the sleeping form of Ronnie, and his body rolled out of the bed, letting
his back take the impact as they tumbled onto the floor.

“What? What are you doing?”, like an
angry bee, she was buzzing, yet confused.

No time to explain, only act. A hail
of noise erupted inside the room. The bed where moments earlier they had been
asleep was being ripped apart by a storm of bullets. The feathers exploded
upwards from the doona. The room was quickly filled with duck feathers floating
to the ground.

“Oh my god!, oh my gawdt‽‽” Ronnie
shrieked with a wilders eyes.

Aside from this outburst she was shaking,
her naked body was calm. Her large breasts rising and falling evenly. A sure
sign she was coping with the pressure.

“Crawl to the door, Ronnie, Go!” so
saying Davis let go of her and started crawling himself.

Who knew what else would be coming
through that window. Clearly they had a night vision or a heat vision scope.
The laser light from the sight was military. The bad guys were tooling up and
coming in hot.

Outside the room they quickly found
some clothes for Ronnie, then headed for the front door. Outside of the
apartment, Davis quickly checked the elevator, it was heading up, still five
floors away.

“Quick!”

He had a basic intuition it was them,
and had no intention of hanging around with Ronnie in tow to find out.

“Fire stairs!”, Davis held Ronnie’s
wrist and tugged her into motion.

They started to descend the stairs.

“De ja vue?”, Ronnie asked, but Davis
silenced her.

“The stairwell echoes sound, shhh”,
then he smiled at her.

At each level a digit was painted onto
the back of the door leading out to that level of the apartment complex. They
had just past “2” and were descending the last four flights of stairs. He was
jumping down the stairs as fast as he could behind Ronnie, when he heard the
number two door crack open.

“Keep going Ronnie! When you get to
the bottom get straight out onto the street and head directly for the police
station on George Street. Stand next to someone else at all times. Even though
its late, try and find and stay with a crowd of people walking in the same
direction. Nothing they have done to this point indicates they are willing to
start indiscriminate killings.”

Davis wasn’t too sure about that, but
he needed her to be strong. She seemed to vacillate between staying and going.
Her eyes looked up into his imploring him.

“Go!”

Davis forced his voice up as high as
he dared. “Go now!”

The light footsteps were descending in
seconds his assailants would be upon him.

How had they found this place so quickly?
He’d ensured they weren’t followed. Doubling back, taking false routes,
changing appearance twice. That meant some form of high tech surveillance.
Either long range scopes from building tops, or perhaps, illegal access to
satellite imaging. Hmm what if it was worse? What if there was someone on the
inside? Access to the police database? The level of organisation required was
starting to really add up.

No more time to think, those light
featherlike footsteps... Davis crouched waiting for his opponent in a small
unseen area of the stairs just below the level one landing. Feather feet walked
across the flat landing. Davis’s leg shot out hooking and tripping the lead
right leg. Dressed all in black, just like the others. Another ninja? Blue
Tiger!

His rage intensified, he would make
these clowns pay. Davis retracted his leg forcing the ninja to trip forward,
keeping a the other’s leg in a tight hold with his own. As he fell forward
Davis brought both arms forward using his fists to bury a hail of punches into
the upper body. Causing it to fall backwards in the opposite direction. The
result was that the other man fell horizontally towards the ground. He brought
his elbow down on the other man’s head and throat, knocking him unconscious and
leaving a nasty headache for the morning when he awoke. When he awoke, well,
the Blue tiger clan were not exactly known to be a forgiving bunch to those
that failed on missions.

He heard a scream from below and
immediately began running for the exit two flights of stairs below. Hurling
himself down the stairs he leapt-ran each flight in two giant strides. His
ankles compressed and groaned at the strain of hitting hard concrete. Davis
reached the ground exit and immediately hurled an explosive front kick at the
doors, which obeyed and exploded outwards with a groan of hinges partially
ripping from their housings.

In front of him a helicopter was
hovering half a metre from the ground. The blades ripping through the air
forcing the air back against his face, throwing up all the debris and loose
dirt in the surrounding gardens. He pushed himself forward against the power of
the wind. The chopper was a light grey colour with thick blue and red diagonal
stripes. A modified, stripped back huey.

He peered into the guts of the door less
cargo bay, seeing Ronnie trussed up, arms bound to legs like a pig. The
modified nature of the chopper became more apparent. As he advanced, a ninja
sitting behind a mounted 50 cal belt fed machine gun opened up.

Reflexes already on edge from a day’s
fighting gave him a narrow edge. He drove his body to the left not even knowing
what was there. He felt his body scraping against the hard concrete of the
path, as he popped into a judo roll and came up behind a short brick wall. All
around him the entire courtyard was being ripped to shreds by the untold power
unleashed from a storm of .50 calibre bullets.

Davis waited, counting. At the precise
time, remaining out of site behind the short wall, he rose, knowing as he did
that the machine gunner would have to wait several seconds to allow the weapons
barrel to cool sufficiently. This guy apparently had no idea or just didn’t
care and continued firing. The weapons firing chamber made a chinking noise, at
the same time that the red hot barrel stopped spitting instant death, and like
a fat Cuban cigar smoked lazily.

Davis knew he had only moments, he
sprinted down the path, the chopper was starting to pull off the ground, he
could feel the backwash of air being fanned down from above. The chopper pilot
had turned the aircraft away to the right so that the cabin crew could no
longer see the path. The tail spun around, the blades narrowly missing Davis as
he came forward beneath the rising chopper.

He jumped thick hands wrapping around
the legs of the chopper. He threw his left arm over the top locking it in with
the right hand. As he kicked his left leg up and over the bar he looked over
his right shoulder and saw the ground falling away already one thousand metres
distant. Over the engine noise he could hear the faint screams of Ronnie, but
nothing else.

This was a Blue Tiger snatch squad,
sent to retrieve a bargaining chip. Standard practise in Asia. Use your
friends, your family, even your children as blackmail. They must have had
extensive surveillance setup to get that far. These days if you wanted to track
someone down double quick you needed access to an eye in the sky.

The latest satellites, launched since
2008 could use laser spectral analysis to pinpoint everything from the
signature of any electronic modern consumable to the water density of every
type of known organic on the planet. They could see under, over and through the
sea, a fact that was still not widely known outside of the intelligence
community. They could use heat and chemical sensors to detect movement in any
direction, through buildings and even underground. In short staying undetected
was next to impossible from one of these suckers. And it had been quick. Far
too quick. The deal with the bikies had only been on the horizon three weeks
ago. The bikies had only committed to terms and transfer protocols in the last
week.

That meant that even with an inside
rat and state of the art surveillance they had been in place for one to three
days. Once again he wondered at the level of his own governments’ involvement.
The mobsters didn’t have satellite time. Not even state sponsored ones.
Especially not the state sponsored ones.

He knew there would have to have been
at least one bad cookie in ASIO cookie jar. A greedy bureaucrat signing away US
satellite time. He wondered if Uncle Sam would be pleased to know that its
south pacific sheriff was proxying resources to Chinese mobsters. He filed it
away for later, when not if there was one.

He had two options. Remain hidden
until the destination, or enter the cargo bay and kill everyone but the pilot.
The problem with hijacking a chopper which wasn’t a highlight of most Hollywood
films was that even if you could fly a chopper yourself, most didn’t have an
autopilot. By the time you removed the existing pilot from the seat the whole
thing would most likely have pitched sideways and fallen out of the sky. Davis
had an ace up his sleeve.

He twisted on the bar so that he was
now draped over it, and brought his feet back towards his knees letting them
rest on the choppers landing bar. He reached up with both hands and as the
chopper rocked to its right, his side was jerked up. Like a panther he launched
upwards, inwards towards the cargo bay, past the silent machine gun mount.

Four more ninjas were inside keeping
Ronnie company. Arms folded, eyes ahead. His method was brutal but effective.
Using aikido leg throws, he grabbed the smaller Asian men and hurled the first
straight out of the chopper. Pivoting to the other side, he grabbed a ninja
with each hand and pulled them to their feet. As he did he dropped all his
weight forward and threw each arm out perpendicular in scything overhand
elbows. Each clipped the inside temple of the two rising ninjas. Stunning and
pushing their centres of balance dangerously towards the open sides of the
cargo bay.

The roar of the chopper screamed. It
began tilting more violently. The passenger had turned and was silently
screaming at his pilot. The two stunned ninjas stooped low and began to rise,
flailing their arms to stop from falling. Davis moved closer and then stepped
between them, moving past and spinning one hundred and eighty degrees fast, so
that he was behind them. He grabbed each from behind, with a fair grip of skin
and black ninja cloth. Then he pushed.

“Fly”

Davis said, “if you can”.

With that they fell towards the
ground. The remaining ninja was out of his seat, approaching warily. Without
any warning, Davis used a sudden forward tilt of the chopper to lunge at his
opponent.This time putting a hand snake
like, up, in, in there.

“Kai!”

Davis screamed an ancient war cry he
had been taught using his voice. Time seemed to slow, for the ninja at least,
even as Davis’s arm slid up and past his defensive pose. He struck with his
fingers extended in a hard spear like posture. Aiming behind and just below the
neck, inserting the index finger into the central nerve point at the top of the
spine. It created a mild block, stunning there lower limbs. It was then a
simple matter to kick away their legs. And push. Only Ronnie remained lying
tied to a seat in the cargo bay.

Her hair was dishevelled. Her eyes had
run, leaving thick trails of mascara running down the sides of her pretty face.
Her head was tilted slightly to one side as she looked up at him with big dove
like eyes. He gave her a quick thumbs up and leaving her to sit and watch,
turned his attention to the cockpit. There was only a small sealed persplex
window for observation. If he wanted to enter the cockpit, he was going to have
to mount an assault from the outside of the chopper and somehow get either door
open. This was easier said than done. Even if the doors were unlocked and
nobody was holding them in the downwash from the blades acted as a drag holding
the door in towards the frame.

It was time for his ace. He positioned
himself in front of the small window and focused his mind. True concentration
came from completely letting go of thoughts, letting them merge into a single
powerful thought. His fist was tight, held next to his ribs. The thought released.
Soon he would have this, soon he would unleash his surprise.

The arm sprung forward like a
catapult. The fist hit the persplex completely shattering it. The chopper
veered violently down and to the left as the pilot was distracted from the
plastic shattering on top of him. His fist turned into a powerful grip which
shifted to the right.

The passenger had recovered from his
shock and was already turning and shifting to the left, bringing his gun up to
shoot. Davis used his wrist to slip a lock around the hand holding the gun,
forcing it to go off whilst it was still pointing at the pilot, who promptly
fell over dead.

Davis’s world seemed to stop. Up until
that point everything had seemed somehow sane, in a quirky kind of post modern
James Bond kind of way. The ace was trumped. Open mirza.So how exactly was this chopper going to land
now anyway?

The control stick pushed forward, the
chopper lurched forward. Time slowed down. Rain pellets pounded the windscreen.
The passenger screamed an unholy high pitched jarring sound. Massive arms
extended out and grabbed the pilot ramming him hard to the left and up against
the pilot door. The passenger shifted over to his left, scooping up the control
stick as he did so.

For a moment he seemed distracted from
the previous minutes. His cold stare was held on the parabolic descent path
that the front of the chopper was sliding down. The rain no longer struck the
windscreen. In mere seconds the blades would lose their “grip” on the air. At
that point time really slowed down. Davis’s own eyes were glued on the scene
confronting him. He was looking at the ground rushing up. The blades were
straining against the limits of their powers. The engine was emitting a loud
thudding noise and a noticeable increase in thermal output.

The passenger’s hooded ninja suit
seemed to billow as his upper body rippled with muscular power. Biceps squeezed
and ripped massive rippling forearms yanked and pulled. It was immediately
obvious that his actions were not those of a noob. Unseen beneath the cockpit
his feet worked the pedals, shifting and guiding the arc from straight down to
an equally violent arc towards the heavens.

The bird screamed as the motor hit max
revs. Oil began to burn from excessive heat build-up. The passenger coolly glinted
out at the world that was now passing on a steadily rising diagonal horizon.
His head was hidden behind a full face ninja mask, so that only evil intent
eyes looked out upon the world. Big black eyes with red irises gave the devil’s
own cause for wickedness a good impression of walking the earth. Even as the
chopper stopped its heaving, his subtle manipulations of the bird continued.

Davis was taken completely off guard
by the choppers sudden wide arc to the left. He had been allowing the passenger
time to right things and deliver his surprise. His flaw almost proved fatal. He
felt rather than thought that he was in freefall. Unlike Ronnie he was not tied
to the floor. The passenger improved the angle turning the entire cargo bay on
its side, almost but not quite pushing the rotor blades beyond the vertical
limit. Davis had hands. I mean when boxer talk about having hands, they mean
fast fabulous hands that dance all day. Davis had hands that were faster. It
was all that saved him.

In the moments preceding the freefall
he had been standing about one third out from the middle of the cargo bay,
closest to the broken cabin window. When he fell his left hand shot out and
grabbed the upper rail that ran around the top of each side of the cargo bay.
Using a rock climbers grip, he held grimly as his entire body weight time’s six
gravities was pulled towards the ground. He knew the passenger could not hold
his aerial manuvoure for more than two seconds. By the time the bird swung back
into a true line with the ground, his left arm was numb from the strain.

He let it fall to his side. He only
needed one good arm. His two feet fell like panther paws to the deck. They
sprung him in a single smooth arc that landed right up next to the cabin
window.

The passenger sensed and reacted as
his senses warned him of impending disaster. Leaving his left arm to guide the
bird, the ninja dextrously raised his right arm and twisted his wrist so that
the curved dagger that suddenly appeared pointed backwards in a wicked arcing motion
towards Davis’s shoulders.The ace was
already in play.

Davis didn’t even try to block the
knife arm. Instead with complete reckless disregard for personal safety he spun
one hundred and eighty degrees so that his right arm was closest to the passenger’s
body. His right elbow shot out violently. It’s powerful tricep punching with
the forward motion of a air fed jackhammer.

The tip punching the knife forearm,
even as it in turned sliced a shoulder to shoulder blade crimson tide. A wide
arc of flesh seemed to hand loosely. But that was because Davis had his good
arm moving with incredible speed. With a single touch of his index finger,
Davis drove into the T4 vertebrae at the base of the neck. Stopping as his nail
was mere millimetres away from the spinal nerve. His ace was delivered.

He felt a rush of energy that seemed
to mingle with the evil spirit. It didn’t matter he felt the warm rush that
signalled his “energy” had taken subconscious decision making capacity away
from his adversary. The passenger was also an adept an fought bitterly against
the mental intrusion. But it was no good. The point of the physical contact, as
Davis had been taught, was to attain an overwhelmingly initial advantage over
the opponents mind, so that they could not defend.

It was said some ancient masters no
longer needed even physical contact to incapacitate foes, before eventually
giving up such techniques altogether. Davis had been gifted with relearning
some of the first stages of this technique, the only ones that still existed.
The passenger sat rigidly as Davis sat on his ear issuing instructions.

“Find a flat area of ground and
descend.”

The passenger, face hidden from view,
was sweating profusely. Veins popped out near his temples as he fought with
every ounce of his being to break the psychic lock. It was no use it was all he
could do just to stop himself from slavishly following the other’s
instructions. His dark pool, the part he thought of as himself, was under
attack. No it was worse, it was being hidden from him. All he could do was
follow the immediate orders given to him, stay busy and wait.

The chopper landed in the green fields
of Parramatta park. As if by design the exact moment of landing seemed overly
rough, and as Davis looked, the passenger somehow, completely against his own
understanding of human physiology managed to grab the pilot door, open it, ram
the dead body and himself head first out of the door, and combat roll away into
the park surrounds. Before Davis could pursue he quickly had to hit the kill
switch on the chopper. The engine seemed sigh as parts cooled back to within
standard operating tolerances.

He looked up but the passenger was
gone. At least both he and Ronnie were safe. He looked around, and she was
crying. The tears of a lady whose purpose was confused and set upon. He
immediately went to her and wrapped his huge arms around her, pulling her
tight.They looked out of the cargo bay
at a small pond. A gaggle of ducks sailed sedately on the ripples from the
chopper’s down wash.